Yet most people vaguely believe the lemming story to be true. It's become quite an important part of their thinking and they are unwilling to let it go.

Say to them that lemmings don’t actually have a mass death-wish, and they will cry out in astonishment and disbelief. Could a similar delusion be affecting views on NATO expansion, supposedly caused by the shivering fear of tiny, furry states cowering on the edge of the Russian bear-pit, begging for our supposedly mighty protection?

Well, that is certainly what almost everyone thinks now, though the distinguished historian Professor Richard Sakwa, of the University of Kent, says in his excellent and courageous book ‘Frontline Ukraine’ that NATO’s expansion has in fact created the very fear against which it claims to be protecting its new members. Let us see.

WE won't buy your tomatoes. Fancy a nuclear umbrella instead?

The first Warsaw Pact country to join NATO was East Germany (the DDR) , which became a NATO member by being absorbed into the Federal Republic in 1990. Amusingly it had always been a de facto member of the Common Market/EU because West Germany refused to maintain a customs barrier between the two states. Three former Warsaw Pact states (the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland) joined NATO in 1999. See if you can find any suggestion, between 1989, when they got their freedom, and 1999, that Russia posed any threat to them, or that anyone was complaining of any such threat.

As I recall, at that time, Russia was (as it is now) economically prostrate and pitifully weak in conventional military terms, easily outnumbered in men and money by NATO as a whole. It also had no actual border with the Czech Republic. Nor did Slovakia, Slovenia, Poland (unless you count the exclave at Kaliningrad), Romania or Bulgaria.

I can recall the joke being told at the time that NATO membership was given to these states as a consolation prize, after the EU told them to wait outside. They had to wait till May 2004 to join the EU, along with Hungary, Slovakia, Slovenia, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Bulgaria and Romania joined the EU in 2007, by which time it had almost completely abandoned any attempts to demand economic and political rigour in its new members and had become openly an instrument of American power in Europe.

Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia joined NATO in March 2004, again as deficit countries, that is to say, they required much more in the way of commitment than they provided in the way of effective force. In the same way most of the EU’s new members demanded far more than they could possibly contribute, and in several cases could only be said to reach EU standards of legality and transparency if the EU closed both its eyes and held its nose.

Did I see the joke ‘We’ve given them our nuclear umbrella because we don’t want to buy their tomatoes’ in the ‘Economist? I haven’t the archive access to find it, but I can’t think where else I got it from. The problem with these countries was that leaving the Warsaw Pact and Comecon, and exposing themselves to the icy winds of capitalism, wasn’t actually quite as good as they had hoped it would be.

Communist education had in fact been quite good.

The old industries and their guaranteed jobs collapsed.Their former markets, for agricultural produce and manufactured goods, were also gone. But they had one huge advantage. Schooling and skill-training under Communism had been surprisingly good, often more rigorous than its western equivalent. They were sources of well-educated cheap labour (and they still are, Poland exports huge amounts of unemployment in the form of low-paid migrant workers, Germany shifted a lot of manufacture to the Czech Republic etc). Most of them would be in a terrible mess had they not latched on to various subsidy teats in the West. Poland’s EU subsidy is gigantic, for instance. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/may/01/eu-poland-10-years-economic

Again, I can recall, at that time, no evidence of any kind that Russia was menacing these countries or making territorial demands upon them. It couldn’t if it wanted to.

‘The picture we are building up in our minds of a revanchist Russia is as absurd as their picture of an aggressive and encircling West. Russian military expenditure is one tenth of NATO’s and their economy one twentieth.’

If Russia wanted to attack the Baltics, it had years to do so

I might add that the three Baltic Republics escaped Moscow’s control in 1991. After the stupid and failed KGB-inspired displays in Riga and Vilnius in January that year, which I witnessed, no further attempt was made to stop them. In the time between their departure and their supposedly frightened scurry under Auntie NATO’s skirts 13 years later. (Thirteen years!) , there was no attempt made by Moscow to reassert control, despite (in two of the Baltic states) some rather stupid and indefensible treatment of the Russian minorities there. Perhaps they wish they had acted. As the Baltic States’ membership of NATO now puts Western forces in Narva 85 miles from St Petersburg, about the same difference as Coventry is from London. We, who are surrounded by deep salt water, would gasp if any of our major cities (especially one which suffered a lengthy enemy siege in living memory) were within such a short distance of the forces of an increasingly hostile alliance.

Now I must once again mention Peter Conradi’s very interesting new book ‘Who Lost Russia’, which will eventually require a full posting here in its own right. Mr Conradi, a distinguished former Moscow foreign co0rrepondent, has looked into the origins of NATO expansion and what he found is devastating.

First, he notes that the great US diplomat George Kennan, the architect of the whole US Cold War policy, opposed NATO expansion as mistaken. In 1947, in dealing with the USSR, he had taken a wholly different view, begging a complacent Washington, stuffed with Soviet fellow-travellers, to grasp that Stalin was not its friend

He said: ‘the main element of any United States policy toward the Soviet Union must be a long-term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies ... Soviet pressure against the free institutions of the Western world is something that can be contained by the adroit and vigilant application of counterforce at a series of constantly shifting geographical and political points, corresponding to the shifts and manoeuvres of Soviet policy, but which cannot be charmed or talked out of existence.’

The father of the Cold War opposed NATO expansion

But that was because he grasped that post 1991 Russia was wholly different from the Soviet Union.

but here’s an example: ‘''I think it is the beginning of a new cold war,'' said Mr. Kennan from his Princeton home. ''I think the Russians will gradually react quite adversely and it will affect their policies. I think it is a tragic mistake. There was no reason for this whatsoever. No one was threatening anybody else.(my emphasis) This expansion would make the Founding Fathers of this country turn over in their graves. We have signed up to protect a whole series of countries, even though we have neither the resources nor the intention to do so in any serious way. [NATO expansion] was simply a light-hearted action by a Senate that has no real interest in foreign affairs.''

He added: ‘ ''I was particularly bothered by the references to Russia as a country dying to attack Western Europe. Don't people understand? Our differences in the cold war were with the Soviet Communist regime. And now we are turning our backs on the very people who mounted the greatest bloodless revolution in history to remove that Soviet regime.”’ (My emphasis)

On 7th February 1997, the London Times, now a keen enthusiast for the ‘New Cold War’ took a very different view. It ran a leading article supporting Mr Kennan.

It said of him’ In measured terms, and with much wisdom, he used the pages of The New York Times to analyse and then denounce the course Mr Clinton had set as "the most fateful error of American policy in the entire post-Cold War era." Mr Kennan will be 93 in nine days time. He is the last survivor of the generation which, in Dean Acheson's memorable description, was present at the creation of the superpower struggle. Three years before Madeleine Albright was born he started service at the American Embassy in Moscow. In 1946, months before President Clinton drew his first breath, he had sent his "long telegram" back to Washington warning his then still starry-eyed political masters about the real intentions and threat of Stalinist Russia...’

‘...Europe lives under the liberty he predicted then. When such a man declares so starkly that Nato expansion would destabilise Russian democracy and "restore the atmosphere of the Cold War", it should send a warning to all. When he asks why East-West relations should "become centred on the question of who would be allied with whom and by implication against whom in some fanciful, totally unforeseeable and most improbable future military conflict", that demands a convincing answer.’

‘As Mr Kennan correctly notes, at some moment over the past 12 months, with no real warning, this radical redesign of Nato's role moved from general proposition to the edge of policy. It did so despite little public deliberation in this continent and virtually none at all in North America. Mr Clinton's conversion seems to have been inspired more by the desire to please voters of Polish descent in Michigan than any serious military calculation.’

They said the policy ‘risks undermining the credibility of Nato, weakening the hand of reformers in Russia, and reducing - not enhancing - the real security of the countries in Central and Eastern Europe.‘ They wouldn't say that now.

So what happened to Western policy. Why was Bill Clinton, a man unversed in and ignorant of foreign policy, persuaded to back this huge and costly u-turn opposed by the most distinguished thinker in the field?

When I was a crude materialist Bolshevik, I used to believe that arms manufacturers more or less ran the world. I was convinced that these merchants of death actually promoted conflict to sell their wares, like the fictional ‘Cator and Bliss’ in Eric Ambler’s popular front thrillers of the 1930s. When I abandoned this rather thuggish political position, I persuaded myself that this was rubbish(which it largely is). Arms manufacturers are just the same as any other business, most of the time.

Can this be the sordid truth behind the New Cold War?

But in the early 1990s, just as Communism itself collapsed, the Marxist world-view seems to have begun to become true again. Please read this :

Read it all, but here are some key segments: ‘American arms manufacturers, who stand to gain billions of dollars in sales of weapons, communication systems and other military equipment if the Senate approves NATO expansion, have made enormous investments in lobbyists and campaign contributions to promote their cause in Washington.

The end of the cold war has shrunk the arms industry and forced it to diversify.

But expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization -- first to Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic, then possibly to more than a dozen other countries -- would offer arms makers a new and hugely lucrative market.

America's six biggest military contractors have spent $51 million on lobbying in the last two years, according to an analysis prepared for The New York Times by the Campaign Study Group, a research company in Springfield, Va.

If lobbying costs were included from all companies that perform military-related activities, like computer and technology firms, they would dwarf the lobbying effort of any other industry. Not all of the lobbying has been for NATO expansion. The contractors have billions of dollars worth of other business before Congress. But NATO expansion has been a central concern because it offers so many opportunities.’

‘Under NATO rules, new members are required to upgrade their militaries and make them compatible with those of the Western military alliance, which oversees the most sophisticated -- and expensive -- weapons and communication systems in the world. The companies that win the contracts to provide that ''inter-operability'' to the aging Soviet-made systems in Eastern Europe will benefit enormously from NATO's eastward expansion.

Thus the sums spent on lobbying and for campaign contributions are relatively small compared with the potential benefits in the new markets provided by a larger NATO, particularly from the sale of big-ticket items like fighter aircraft.’

Well, I learned in my Soviet days that the madder something appeared to be (e.g. empty restaurants refusing trade because they were ‘full’, vodka served in teapots and poured into teacups), the more certain it was that it had, buried somewhere, a strong, simple material explanation. Have we here found the squalid, crude reason for the otherwise crazy revival of a dead conflict in the heart of Europe?

As a kind of summary of that discussion, I would like to relate to two quotes from Mr Hitchens, which I find crucial in the debate.

PH: *** "France had lost interest in offensive warfare long before, and, though it had an Army of some size, did not train or equip it for offensive action". ***

This is crucial: even an army as powerful as French is useless if they do not want to fight (in 1939, 1,8 m German army would have faced 1 m Polish army and 4.66 m (sic!) of the French army; it would have been 5 German battleships against 22 French and German; Luftwaffe had 1,000 planes in 39, RAF: 1,500).

In connection with Mr Hitchen's remark, I'd like to note that one of the reasons the French didn't want to fight was a) because their morale had been systematically diluted by German propaganda - after all, the author of the phrase "Mais mourir pour Dantzig, non!" turned out to be a German agent, and b) with army so powerful as French and the Maginot Line they considered impossible to break through, they could not envisage that someone would dare to attack them.

I would encourage anyone who has not come across this figure yet to take interest in interviews of KGB-defector Yuri Bezmenov - widely available on the internet - to see how this process of diluting nation's morale could have been done (all cultural differences between hippie-60s US and 30s France allowing, I think the softening and breaking of social tissue works the same - pay attention to what Mr Bezmenov said that cultural sabotage takes usually 20 years for a new generation to grow).

Bear in mind that Dr Goebbels read and was of very enthusiastic opinion of Edward Bernays 1928 book "Propaganda" (btw, I am waiting for some British historian of the future to research and inform me IF and how the "Focus" group that was influencing some British politicians was connected on Lord Duff Cooper's visit to Gdynia in 1938 - after whose visit Poland tilted decisively against joining the Axis or even staying neutral (he had visited Denmark, Sweden and Norway before - busy bee no doubt) - btw, some say that it was Lord Cooper who "planted" Ms Simpson to Edward Windsor, but I didn't research it enough to say "yes" or "nay" - what I did find however is that Lord Cooper's sister was a grandmother of - strike me pink! - David Cameron).

Last but not least, I’d like to prolong the life of an insightful comment of Mr Hitchens which I find the second most crucial thing, and which didn’t receive its due attention:

***PH notes: Japan's attack on Malaya and Singapore was made possible only by the defeat of France, which allowed Japan staging bases in what is now Vietnam, and our weakness and peril following Dunkirk. ***

"So existing suspicion of the longer term intentions of the French and UK governments, intensified by London's seeming urgency to have an alliance with Poland, would have put Germany in a situation (as they would see it) of either having to strike first, or risk itself being attacked from three directions."

I have to modify your remark though: the said existing suspicion intensified by London's urgency to ally with Poland put Germany in situation of ABANDONING their existing plan to attack France first, and come up with a new plan to ATTACK POLAND FIRST (as they hoped until January 1939, their ally) INSTEAD. Why? They knew that if they attack France, Poland will s u r e l y counterattack (after all, they proposed it twice to France - in 1934, and in 1936); while if they attack Poland first, France might attack or not - or attack, but not with full force (i.e. maybe stopping at Rheinland).

1939 Wehrmacht was but a shadow of Wehrmacht of the Battle for Britain – another reason why it was in French and British interest to counterattack. Remember that it took Nazi Germany AND USSR and Czechoslovakian resources to beat abandoned Poland which had wrong strategy and only used half of its equipment.

EVEN SO, Germans had troubles in Poland UNTIL the Soviets attacked from the east.

Poland was superior in:

1. Infantry training (far better efficiency of shooting)
2. Machine guns (i.e. wz. 38 was at superior to German guns, and it had some solution used today, while wz. 35 "Ur" was the most modern in the world - it could penetrate every German tank of 1939 - unfortunately, due to large German 5th column in Poland - like today ;-) - it was so secret that even the army didn't know about it, and it reached them too late).

Also, did you know that the best Polish army - Poznan Army under the command of gen. Kutrzeba - was practically not used, because it waited for permission to attack Berlin (after French counterattack that never came)? Daft, ain't it?

If it took all what Britain had to win the Battle for Britain when Germany was much stronger, then Britain could have beaten a much w e a k e r Germany in 1939: besides, it would have had the French fleet that Churchill order to destroy.

I. HITLER left ONLY 23 DIVISIONS ON WESTERN FRONT, while the allies had 110 DIVISIONS (and almost no planes!).

II. THE French HAD 4 TO 1 ADVANTAGE IN ARTILLERY, 80 TO 1 ADVANTAGE IN TANKS and the Germans hardly had any planes there.

III. During Nurnberg trials General Alfred Jodl ADMITTED THAT GERMANY WOULD EASILY BE DEFEATED IN 1939 HAD THE ALLIES HELPED THE POLES.

In our hindsight perception of the strength of the German Army, no thought is given in the west to the fact that the entire Polish war plan was based on the assumption of the western counter-attack, and Polish counter-attack from the safety of the eastern parts of Poland (where Poland had the ramaining half of equipment stored which was not used due to the Soviet attack on September 17 - the allies didn’t deign to tell Poland that the USSR will attack.

The topography is in the east would made it impossible for Wehrmacht to rely on tanks, and in the level of infantry training, Polish army was actually superior (the best example is the Battle of Mokra, in which my grandfather participated serving in cavalry, and which Germans lost).

Also, the purchases of Polish army a s s u m e d the allies counterattack. These purchases were largely financed by the nation donating what they had, including wedding jewellery, as shortly before 1939, Britain actually granted more loans to the Turkish army than to Polish, not even sending the equipment that Poland had already paid for. The superior Royal Navy – after all they did manage to impose a maritime blockade in September - was supposed to provide the arms immediately after British war declaration - hence Polish fierce fights to keep the access to the Baltic in Hel.

Had Poland known that there would be no western counter-attack, they would not have bought submarines that were then donated to the British and used in Norway, but there would have bought more anti-tank weapons instead.

Consider this: if 1200 Polish cannons destroyed 42% of German tanks, then for
5 submarines,
4 destroyers,
and 40 bombers,

Poland could have tripled the anti-tank weapons, and completely destroyed ALL German armoured vehicles! One of Wehrmacht commanders, Holder, wrote a diary called “War diary”. In it, he says, p. 126 (I’m quoting Polish translation of 1971, but it had been published in German before): “Had Poland bought more anti-tank weapons instead, our victorious march would have been impossible”.

The reality was different than the Polish cavalry attacking German tanks in Goebbels propaganda film which he staged and for which he used the Slovakian soldiers to act. When they attacked France, a whopping 50pc of German tanks were the old Czech tanks rebranded as German Panzer 38(t); overall the annexation of Czechoslovakia increased the German power by 2/3 (among others, 750,000 machine guns).

Did any British historian ask himself a question why Poland didn’t bomb Germany? It had a successful PZL 37, which was ordered by Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Turkey, Romania, Estonia, Finland and Denmark – but they were never used in Germany. The reason was outrageous – the military agreements with France and Britain stipulated that for the allies to counter-attack, Poland has to a) fight for 2 weeks and b) not attack targets in Germany, because that would constitute an aggressive war. So they didn’t, and then… Germans bombed all the airports – and it was goodbye, Irene.

Grzegorz Kolodziej
I have been following this thread with interest , this chaps belief that Poland+Britain+France could have easily defeated Germany in 1939 , I find this comment not very credible , none of the three countries realised what the German Army and Air Force was capable of before hostilities began , even after the demonstration of Polands armies being smashed in 1939 , by the modern German forces , did not cause Britain & France to greatly alter their Armies tactics against Germany in 1940 .
The outcome would have been the same , except it would have led to an unrecoverable allied defeat . Good luck the little ships bringing the boys back from Gdansk to fight again .

1. PH: ***Neither Hitler nor Beck nor Ribbentrop showed any serious interest in negotiations during the last days of peace.***

At that stage of the diplomatic game of all parties involved - no, they didn’t. However, one has to bear in mind that when Hitler was waiting for Poland’s final response, he was assuming that Beck and Lipski knew about the “partition” annex of the Ribbentrop-Molotov pact – but the British and the Americans (who knew about from Hans von Herwart) didn’t tell them, clearly pushing Poland towards war to buy more time and let the Poles do the fighting for them, while not intending to keep their agreements (the latter only concerns Britain, as there was no Polish-US agreement)

2. PH: *** It may not have occurred to Hitler that Britain and France would declare war and then do absolutely nothing *** That is correct. In what must be the funniest quote in the history of WWII, after Britain declared war on Germany, Hitler reacts to the news that no one believes his promises any longer and therefore there shall be no further negotiations by screaming: “Idiots! Have I ever lied in my life?”

3. PH notes: *** People say this, but I really do not see why it is so.*** For example the very same historian to which you refer me – Mr Taylor – believed in authenticity of the Hossbach Memorandum of 1937, according to which after Austria and Czechoslavakia, France was next to be attacked. Taylor drew attention to one thing that the memorandum can be used to prove; “Goering, Raeder and Neurath had sat by and approved of Hitler’s aggressive plans”. Then, having come across a revisionist goldmine in writing, Taylor changed his mind, but some others (Mr Hugh Trevor-Roper) didn’t. Unfortunately, I am too busy this weekend to go down the splitters in discussion on the authenticity of the Hossbach Memorandum (I can refer to Prof. David Cesarani for example, or to a recent debate that took place in Poland on the British guarantees between a controversial Polish historian Piotr Zychowicz with a controversial British historian Andrew Roberts. Hossbach Memorandum notwithstanding, the fact is that III Reich didn’t draw up a war plan with Poland until April 1939 while it had such plan for France.

4. PH: *** the main threat to Britain would have been economic, in loss of markets***
Even if, for a rimland empire that Britain was that would have been all, and remember: with the USSR conquered, I doubt that the US would have chosen a little rugged island to ally with against the Eurosian empire.

I think I have to conclude on that, unfortunately – purely for my work deadline reasons. Fascinating discussion. Btw – referring to one of your previous columns, Polish word for danger is also “lack of safety” – “niebezpieczenstwo”.

Grzegorz Kolodziej | 03 March 2017 at 11:10 AM :
*** Poland war plan was not for a war with Germany AND USSR (Poland had 400 planes, and another 400 stored in the east; 500 tanks, and another 500 stored in the east) AND with NO counter-attack/no supplies. German attack on Poland was – until September 17, the day Soviet Russia attacked – not a walkover, like it was in France. Germany could have been EASILY DEFEATED BY POLAND + FRANCE + BRITAIN ...***

So existing suspicion of the longer term intentions of the French and UK governments, intensified by London's seeming urgency to have an alliance with Poland, would have put Germany in a situation (as they would see it) of either having to strike first, or risk itself being attacked from three directions.

NB ***PH Notes: Mr Kolodziej has posted almost all of this (below)before in near-identical contribution yesterday, which I answered. I reproduce his posting with my comments, at the bottom of this one.I don't think it is right for him to all-but repeat this posting, while making no effort to address my rebuttals.****

Who else took the British guarantee seriously? Hitler took it seriously. Hitler’s objective has been an alliance with Poland, and discussions in Britain are carried out in the spirit as if Poland had been bound to be attacked this way or the other. On March 25 (so even after Poland had rejected the offer to join the Axis) Hitler issues a directive: “Der Fuehrer does not wish to solve the Danzig question by force. He does not wish to drive Poland into the arms of Britain by this”. Had Hitler not taken the British guarantee seriously, he would not made “a large, comprehensive offer to the British Empire”, renewing the assurance that Germany’s frontier in the west was final (Henderson to Halifax, August 25). Few people know that Hitler had no war plan with Poland until April 11, 1939 – because his initial plan going back as early as 1937 was “to act at some time within the next five or six years before ‘two hate-inspired antagonists’, Britain and France, closed the gap in the Arms race, in which, Hitler noted, Germany was already falling behind” (Manfred Messerschmidt, in “Germany and the Second World War”, pages 636–637).

So jargogled was Hitler’s mind over the British Parliament meeting a day before, that he POSTPONED THE WAR: on August 26, at 3pm, he orders an immediate attack on Poland – then Ribbentrop reports to him that the formal alliance between Great Britain and Poland has just been signed in London. Hitler summons Keitel and says: “Stop everything at once, fetch Brauchtisch immediately”.

Regardless of the guarantee, a question comes to the fore whether it was in Britain’s and France’s interest to counter-attack. Anyone who thinks that having conquered Europe would not attack England is more naïve than those Poles of 1939 who believed Great Britain. Historically, every time one country dominates Europe, they sooner or later sally forth the English Channel. If anything, without Poland being attacked first, the Battle for Britain would have been fought earlier, without Polish pilots and Polish help of Enigma codes.

The USSR has only decided to attack Poland after his man Philby, who participated in the Abbeville conference on September 12, reported to Stalin that the western allies decided not to do anything for Poland after all.

Poland war plan was NOT for a war with Germany AND USSR on her own (Poland had 400 planes, and another 400 stored in the east; 500 tanks, and another 500 stored in the east – so Poland only used half of its equipment, and counter-attack from France would have been lethal for Germany). Germany could have been EASILY DEFEATED BY POLAND + FRANCE + BRITAIN, and then Stalin would have not attacked Poland either. Are you people telling me that this was not in Britain’s interest?

***

Mr Kolodziej's posting of yesterday(with my responses inserted):

'Hitler did take the guarantees quite seriously. Hitler’s objective has been an alliance with Poland, and discussions in Britain are carried out in the spirit as if Poland had been bound to be attacked this way or the other. On March 25 (so even after Poland had rejected the offer to join the Axis) Hitler issues a directive: “Der Führer does not wish to solve the Danzig question by force. He does not wish to drive Poland into the arms of Britain by this”. Had Hitler not taken the British guarantee seriously, he would not made “a large, comprehensive offer to the British Empire”, renewing the assurance that Germany’s frontier in the west was final (Henderson to Halifax, August 25). So jargogled was Hitler’s mind over the British Parliament meeting a day before, that he POSTPONED THE WAR: on August 26, at 3pm, he orders an immediate attack on Poland – then Ribbentrop reports to him that the formal alliance between Great Britain and Poland has just been signed in London. Hitler summons Keitel and says: “Stop everything at once, fetch Brauchtisch immediately”. ***PH writes: there are different interpretations of this delay. See A.J.P.Taylor and Donald Cameron Watt. Neither Hitler nor Beck nor Ribbentrop showed any serious interest in negotiations during the last days of peace. It may not have occurred to Hitler that Britain and France would declare war and then do absolutely nothing, one of the oddest events in human history. He probably thought they would not declare war. Once they had done, he would certainly have sought a peace deal if available, but he was not going to miss the opportunity (while his Eastern front was safe) to knock France out of the war business forever, as he then did. What is certain is that Hitler's generals did not believe there was any likelihood of a British military intervention in the event of a German attack on Poland. Also note that the 'guarantee' specifically excluded Britain from taking any action over a Soviet invasion of Poland (which Halifax duly refused to do, when the moment came). The whole thing was utterly cynical. Beyond doubt, Joszef Beck's behaviour was influenced by the guarantee, which dissolved the Polish-German Pact and made its planned renewal impossible, and persuaded Beck that he could quite safely refuse to negotiate over Danzig and the corridor. France had lost interest in offensive warfare long before, and, though it had an Army of some size, did not train or equip it for offensive action. *** Regardless of the guarantee, a question comes to the fore whether it was in Britain’s and France’s interest to counter-attack. Anyone who thinks that having conquered Europe (and, with Polish help, most likely Moscow and energy sources in Caucasus too) Germany would not attack Britain, is naïve. Historically, every time one country dominates Europe, they sooner or later sally forth the English Channel. If anything, without Poland being attacked first, the Battle for Britain would have been fought earlier, without Polish pilots and Polish help of Enigma codes. ***PH notes: People say this, but I really do not see why it is so. What would have been the point? Unlike the Kaiser, Hitler was interested primarily in an east-facing land empire. Had he succeeded, the main threat to Britain would have been economic, in loss of markets *** The USSR has only decided to attack Poland after his man Philby, who participated in the Abbeville conference on September 12, relayed to Stalin that the western allies decided not to do anything for Poland after all (like I said, some French troops crossed the German border). Poland war plan was not for a war with Germany AND USSR (Poland had 400 planes, and another 400 stored in the east; 500 tanks, and another 500 stored in the east) AND with NO counter-attack/no supplies. German attack on Poland was – until September 17, the day Soviet Russia attacked – not a walkover, like it was in France. Germany could have been EASILY DEFEATED BY POLAND + FRANCE + BRITAIN, and then Stalin would have not attacked. Are you telling me that this was not in Britain’s interest? P.S. Remark on Gdansk/Danzig: Poland’s stubborn stance on Danzig might seem irrational. But if we look at the Polish history, then we will understand the motives of these politicians: Poland had just raised from the partitions, and partitions began from a seemingly insignificant event: small Spisz (Spis in Slovakian) counties, Polish since 1412, were annexed by Austria in 1769 (not in 1772, as the English Wikipedia gives) – and Poland didn’t react. 3 years later, the partitions of Poland began. Józef Beck was very aware of that.'

I have to reiterate: if you claim that the Britain owed nothing to Poland despite signing a military pact with Poland and RAF command obliging themselves that should Germany invade Poland "the Royal Air Force would attack industrial, civilian, and military targets", then the consequence (unintended I suspect) of that view is that Britain is (or was in 1939) some sort of a pirate state, with which it is not worth to sign any international agreements or military pacts, because Britain (like, say, Zimbabwe) will not keep them.

***PH notes: Even so, this is the case. Britain made the guarantee, even reinforcing it on the eve of war, despite the Chiefs of Staff having repeatedly informed the government quite unequivocally. that Britain would be powerless to help Poland. This is documented fact recorded in all serious histories of the period . the German High Command, likewise, regarded the promise as worthless and did not expect any action as a result of it. Nobody took it seriously except the Poles. I am increasingly of the view that Halifax sought the guarantee so that Britain was bound to go to war with Germany, a course he was set on for mingled reasons of deluded national pride(the wish to show we were still a great power) and confused principle.***

This is not my view of Britain (even of 1939 Britain - or rather her government at that time), but this is a logical consequence of your claim: "we owed nothing to Poland" - because we are people not honourable enough to keep our word.

The question is: was it in Britain's interest to counterattack with France? And the answer is (answer shared by me and WWII RAF command in their own words - in hindsight, of course) that it was, because Germany was virtually undefended in the west in September 1939, and 3,000 superior French tanks + RAF would have gone through Germany LIKE A KNIFE THROUGH BUTTER.

In fact, some lightly armed French troops who did so (a few miles reconnaissance) and met NO RESISTANCE.

There is not need to be emotional and have hard feelings about it, Colin (this also relates to me). Just look at the map of German troops in first 2 weeks of September 1939 - had France and Britain attacked them as promised, Germany WOULD HAVE FALLEN, and no blood (including Polish) in the Battle for Britain would have been shed.

P.S. This is just a marginal remark: Anglo-German Naval Agreement of 1935 was a major BLUNDER of the British. Even Peter would have to admit that. This was a huge signal to Hitler: friendly (Britain was friendly to Hitler until almost WWII) Britain will not intervene, as I predicted in "Mein Kampf".

Poland would have never signed anything like that in 1935.

The whole British policy of Lloyd George of worrying that Britain has to help weak, harmless Germany to prevent the French-Polish alliance was a blunder too.

Take care and try not to take personally what I say - I am saying it "sine ira et studio", worried that Britain of today is making the same mistake, ignoring Germany’s 150bn army spending plan and their attempts to overthrow legally elected governments in eastern Europe, and that British politicians are not aware of what kind of mandman Martin Schulz (Germany’s future Chancellor if God deigns to punish us) is, saying in plain German that German policy goals “will have to implemented by force” (“mit Macht durchsetzen”); btw, Mr Schulz’s entire family were SS-men, Gestapo, and one was torturing prisoners.

We have to take into account that in 1939, both Britain and Poland still believed that the British Navy will ensure that the British Empire would go on for a good while (there was an eruption of joy in Warsaw when Britain declared a war, because the Poles thought that the Royal Navy would soon supply them with previously ordered arms – hence Poland’s desperate fights to keep Hel and Westerplatte).

Supposing however that Poland would have stayed neutral to Hitler: even though Hitler declared that it wasn’t his intention to strip Britain of its rimland empire status, limiting his ambitions to the Eurasian heartland (of course he didn’t use terms taken from Halford MacKinder, but he was familiar with these concepts, indirectly via Prof. Haushofer) - yet his conquer of Europe would have thrown a spanner in the British foreign policy works of maintaining the balance of power on the continent (btw, in 1930, the US even drew up proposals specifically aimed at eliminating all British land forces in Canada and the North Atlantic, thus destroying Britain's trading ability).

Sadly, the Brits wrongly identified factors which would secure that balance of power in Europe: they overestimated France’s strength – they should have hedged their bets on Pilsudski’s Intermarium instead – something which the Americans do nowadays. Their wrong evaluation of the situation in Europe (and underestimation of Hitler) hark back to misinterpretation of the 1934 German–Polish Non-Aggression Pact. While this wasn’t, contrary to what it sometimes believed, the kind of a Pact that the disgraceful Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact was (or even Rapallo and Locarno treaties, which, as often forgotten, made it possible for the Weimar Republic to circumnavigate the Treaty of Versailles and rearm) - the Treaty merely obliged them to forgo armed conflict for a period of 10 years – still, in the eyes of the British diplomacy, even neutral Poland was a danger to the balance of power in Europe.

Why did Poland sign this pact?
In 1933, Józef Pilsudski came up with his proposal to France to declare war on Germany after Adolf Hitler had come to power (see for example George H. Quester, “Nuclear Monopoly”, p. 27; or Victor Rothwell, “Origins of the Second World War”, p. 92).
France refused.

The crucial moment was 1936 and the Remilitarization of the Rhineland. Deuxième Bureau sent in a report to the French cabinet estimating that there were 295,000 German troops in the Rhineland, which was exaggerated to the point of raising a question whether the Germans had a snitch there (the real number was 3,000 German soldiers, and Poland did agree to mobilize its forces if France did first – but France didn’t).

Only against this background we can properly understand Lord Duff Cooper’s famous visit to the Polish port of Gdynia in late summer of 1938, onboard the “Enchantress” yacht, and the beginning of the British diplomacy game to dupe Poland into believing that Britain will really intervene militarily.

Grzegorz Kolodziej | 27 February 2017 at 07:11 PM :
*** What if Poland had joined Axis, as asked by Hiltler many times? Would Britain be better off? ***

Maybe, if Britain had opted for neutrality in what became WW2 -- though subsequent developments in the Far East might have changed that anyway.

***PH notes: Japan's attack on Malaya and Singapore was made possible only by the defeat of France, which allowed Japan staging bases in what is now Vietnam, and our weakness and peril following Dunkirk. ***

It may be that the UK announcing a desire to safeguard Poland (despite lacking the ability to do so) was intended to make sure that Germany and Poland became more suspicious of each other, in case they did combine against the USSR and win ... or just formed some sort of economic alliance.
The pact between Germany and the USSR thereafter does seem sudden enough to raise suspicions....
But returning to UK assurances ... possibility (not certainty) of a potential rival to fatcat interests in Londinium ... oh no, couldn't be having that.
The US establishment have much the same mindset; they're the top dogs now.

"What was true of the Poles was also true of other nationalities who fought with the British."

The problem with that claim is that, as demonstrated by me in my comments below, Polish contribution to Britain's glory was bigger than any other nationalities apart from Americans.

"We who were privileged to fly and fight with them will never forget and Britain must never forget how much she owes to the loyalty, indomitable spirit and sacrifice of those Polish fliers. They were our staunchest Allies in our darkest days; may they always be remembered as such!
— Group Captain John A. Kent DFC, AFC, Virtuti Militari"

And that's only a tip of the iceberg - some British historians claim that cracking Enigma shortened the war by 2 years.

I also recommend that you google for an article in "The Daily Mail" called:

"Why did we humiliate the Polish aces after their Battle of Britain heroics? How an ungrateful nation wanted to deport the men our women fell for and Hitler feared".

I agree that UK's army was not up to scratch - you had the enemy within in the Parliament: The Labour Party.

But Britain was supposed to act combined with France, and none of them did.
Also, you could have armed the Polish Army to their teeth via credits from the City (Poland had to pay for planes used by the Polish pilots fighting for Britain anyway!).

Remember: 6 million Poles died in WWII from the hands of Germans, including those who died in Auschwitz (which until 1943 was a German death camp for mainly Poles, and then also for Jews) - plus those who died from the hands of Soviets - and Poland could have enjoyed a quiet war time of Slovakia instead...

"Britain was under no obligation to do anything for Poland,"
- it clearly was: that's why it signed a military pact with Poland.

Are you saying that Britain is a country which should not be taken seriously when it comes to its international agreements? In these matters, I think that General Sir Edmund Ironside is a bigger authority than you, and he said - following Britain signing the agreement - “The Poles could be confident that Britain would carry out bombing raids in Germany once hostilities began.”

"It failed, but at least the gesture was made." - the truth is that Britain has signed an agreement and did not keep it - contrary to what you claim, there was no help (only a gesture - as you rightly noticed; well, Poland offered more than a gesture: without encoding Enigma, Polish intelligence information and Polish participation in the Battle for Britain, Britain would have been screwed - this was the assessment of RAF, very hard to stomach for a living in a "heroic Britain" fantasy propaganda modern Brit - I know). Time to grow up.

"Pray what else should it have done in the circumstances, when it took all we had to defend ourselves? " –

"General Ironside commented in 1945:

"Militarily we should have gone all out against the German the minute he invaded Poland ... We did not ... And so we missed the strategic advantage of the Germans being engaged in the East. We thought completely defensively and of ourselves."

What part of that sentence you do not understand?

" We hear a lot of sentimental pc guff about the British needing to show 'gratitude' to these people, when actually it is they who should show gratitude." -

no, you did not hear anything for 50 years - your history teachers glossed over these things, you had censorship on things like Katyn, and you still have censorship on Sikorski's air crash (I suspect the truth would not show Britain in a favourable light, otherwise why prolonging the "classified" category?).

Thankfully, not all Brits are so ignorant on history (i.e.the Enigma thing was changed in Britannica thanks to Prince Charles's intervention).

Gratitude for what exactly? For defending Britain with money paid from Polish Central Bank's gold deposited in London? Are you saying you'd rather Britain fall to Nazi Germany?

"They were fighting for Poland, using Britain as a vehicle for doing so because apart from the Russian communists who they hated as much or more than the Germans, it was the only realistic available option."

The best option was to not cowardly abstain from any fight in September 1939, and then you would not have to defend yourself in the "Battle for Britain".

What if Poland had joined Axis, as asked by Hiltler many times? Would Britain be better off?

Your remarks about Britain in WW2 are ungracious. Britain was under no obligation to do anything for Poland, another far away country about which we knew little and cared less.

We offered help in a belated effort to dampen Hitler's enthusiasm for annexing other countries. It failed, but at least the gesture was made.

If Britain's immediate response to the Nazi attack was feeble, that was because our armed forces were not up to scratch in the earliest stages of the War.

According to you, Britain only considered itself in the War. Pray what else should it have done in the circumstances, when it took all we had to defend ourselves?

It should be pointed out in this connection that Poles fighting Germany were not fighting for Britain as such. They were fighting for Poland, using Britain as a vehicle for doing so because apart from the Russian communists who they hated as much or more than the Germans, it was the only realistic available option.

As it happens, I knew some Polish WW2 RAF pilots personally, so I know what I am talking about there. What was true of the Poles was also true of other nationalities who fought with the British. We hear a lot of sentimental pc guff about the British needing to show 'gratitude' to these people, when actually it is they who should show gratitude.

As for saying that the exportation of Polish unemployment to Britain is a fair tit for tat for the trade imbalance - how feeble is that?

The last sentence with downplaying non-European/extreme Islam angle is very true - and I'll relate to that - but first, let me explain.

He could not have German for example, because Germans use discriminatory practices against Polish transport companies: the established practice in Germany is to postpone the unloading of transport companies from Poland while NOT ensuring them safe place to park (which ensures that German transport companies can compete with Polish ones, because by the time the waiting Polish lorries are unloaded, the German can do a few rounds). The Polish driver's plan was to discharge his lorry in the morning, then go to Italy, and come back to Poland for Christmas – but he had to wait in an unsafe place until late at night for a the German officers to do their duty, where he was attacked and his lorry was hijacked.

As to the actual reporting, German media (first article in "Die Welt") argued that the Polish driver prevented the truck from braking when hitting the Christmas fair stands and the people. When you think about it, this narrative was hitting two birds with one stone: showing that not only radical Muslims are prone to terror attacks, but also eastern Europeans, and secondly undermining credibility of Polish lorry companies, currently dominating the EU market.

For someone who follows both Polish and German media, what the latter do is sometimes tragic-comic – i.e., German TV showed a moving interview with Polish celebrity journalist, Mr Tomasz Lis, who had been sacked by demonic Kaczynski for daring to be critical towards the new oppressive regime. Mr Tomasz Lis, indubitably the most despised and laughed at journalist in Poland (recently even within his own circles), resorted before the Presidential election in his article in “Newsweek” to a despicable “revelation” that the father-in-law of President Duda is Jewish; however, contrary to his expectations, this did not discredit Mr Duda in the eyes of PiS electorate, but rather it discredited Mr Lis and "Newsweek". Then Lis MADE UP a quote from Mr Duda’s daughter intimating that Andrzej Duda, if elected, will return the Oscar for “Ida” – so he was let go (even though it was Kaczynski who, during his term as Prime Minister, employed Lis to have a balanced pool of journalists - btw, no journalist critical of PO could work on national TV under Donald Tusk).

Now Tomasz Lis limits himself to his Twitter account, making up more fake stories (i.e. he recently came up with photomontage showing Marian Kowalski, the nationalist commentator on internet TV “Idz Pod Prad”, giving a Roman salute – for a greater dramatic effect, in a brown uniform) – but in German media, he became a symbol of oppressed freedom in Poland.
I recommend reading an article “Who Defends Polish Democracy with German Money?” in “Poland Current Events” to gain a better understanding of what really goes on in Polish and German media.

Grzegorz Kolodziej | 26 February 2017 at 02:27 PM :
*** And the German media are even worse (i.e. “Die Welt” first reaction to terror attack in Berlin was to… blame the Polish lorry driver!).***

To be fair, though initial reporting may have placed a focus on the original (murdered) driver being Polish, he probably could have been any North European nationality and the same would have happened. Mass-media automatically following the requirements of the political establishment, in trying to downplay any non-european / extreme-Islamist angle.

As to "the nationalist wing of the PiS to legislate to limit the discussion of Poland’s modern history", I am not aware of any such thing.

On the contrary, for the first time for many years there are real debates of Poland's modern history in the media [in my opinion, too many - I'd rather have TVP focusing on economy and Realpolityk: economy is the Achilles hill of the new government, although not as bad as the previous PO government - whose Finance Minister, btw, was completely controlled by the City) - I think that when it comes to diversity of opinions, Polish TV could be an example not only for German media (who, for example, resort to manipulations such as showing pictures of Polish women and children transported in cattle wagons in Auschwitz as describing them as Germans expellees, but even for BBC - who, for the last 2 decades, has really gone to the dogs when it comes to objectivism); ZDF has even lost a court case over things like that, and was ordered to issue an apology for 30 consecutive days - they did not - so much for " EU standards of legality and transparency if the EU closed both its eyes and held its nose"].

Btw, the biggest divisions in the Polish government are not about history, but about China.

But this, and the historical debates, ar topic for another discussion, another week (another month maybe).

Regarding “legislate to limit the discussion of Poland’s modern history was surely a mistake”: this looks very different from Polish insider perspective than a completely distorted image of these events portrayed by western media. Let me give you a few examples (based just on one paper, but I could furnish you with similar examples regarding BBC or virtually all German media). “The Irish Times” has a correspondent based in Berlin who reports on PiS based on the coverage from the (fully controlled) German media. I wrote a clarification to their extremely bad journalism:

“Derek Scally reports from Berlin (“Poland marks anniversary of first constitution with calls for new one, May 4”) that the new Polish government is deliberately undermining “a system of checks and balances established in the post-communist era” - the Tribunal was not established in the post-communist era – it was formed in 1982 under martial law and it has ruled (in 2007) that investigations into the background of former communist agents, who might be holding positions of public importance, and whose job was to persecute Solidarity union members, would breach their human right to private life (?!). Secondly, the Tribunal is not allowed to initiate legislation, but it just did so by cooking up a new law that violated the constitution and appointed new members before the justices’ terms were up - now it is acting as the judiciary in a trial contesting the constitutionality of legislation it has illegally created.”

They didn’t publish it. I also wrote:

“I am referring to an article by Derek Scally (Irish Times, June 12) in which he claims that Poland's state run broadcaster TVP has censored President Obama remarks (the difference being that President Obama said "Poland stands and needs to continue to stand as an example for democratic practices around the world" and TVP's translation was "Poland is and will be an example of democracy for the whole world").”

The thing is that not only I checked the original TVP broadcast, but I obtained a written text of President Obama’s speech from the US embassy, and the information (taken by “The Irish Times” from their correspondent in Berlin) was wrong.

They did not publish my clarification; instead, they brought their “PiS is a threat to democracy” hysteria to another level, accusing PiS of “a purge of the PO-critical journalists”.

Finally, they resorted to Goebbels-style manipulation, so I wrote:

“In an article by Mr Scally ("President to hold talks with Polish opposition over protests", December 19), a photograph is shown, with a commentary: "Protest organised by the club of the Polish newspaper “Gazeta Polska” in front of the presidential palace in Warsaw". Actually, the opposite is true - this was a support rally for the PiS government.”

They did not publish that either. And the German media are even worse (i.e. “Die Welt” first reaction to terror attack in Berlin was to… blame the Polish lorry driver!).

Regarding PiS (UKiP’s biggest ally in the EU Parliament): on top of everything what you said (and which is true), I’d like to point out that Poland is one of very few countries left in Europe which are not openly hostile to post-Brexit’s Britain: following Brexit referendum, Jaroslaw Kaczynski said that any attempts to punish the UK will only accelerate the break up of the beleaguered bloc, adding: "Britain is being treated arrogantly today, which is a hysterical reaction." Prime Minister Szydło wrote that “Poland stands ready to help its old friend Britain reach the best possible Brexit deal”, and in an interview with the Daily Telegraph this February, Jarosław Kaczyński said: “Officially everyone loves the United Kingdom and doesn’t want to give them a hard time. But some people really want to make it as tough as possible for the United Kingdom”, and formulated an alternative vision that “would bring us back close to the origin of the European Union, back to the European Economic Community (EEC), with rules that would make it difficult for any one nation to gain hegemony over others.”

“As far as I can see, Poland has shut the door on refugees even more firmly than Hungary.”

Few people realise that Poland was one of the first countries to offer to take refugees from Syria – via families gathered around parishes. Approximately 1,000 arrived, stayed 2 weeks, and they all escaped to Germany. At the same time, Poland took one million genuine refugees/immigrants from Ukraine who found employment there – so there must be something wrong with the refugees, not with Poland.

Now, prior to PiS coming to power, Germany wanted Poland to keep these people BY FORCE, building camps on Poland’s eastern border (so that it wouldn’t be easy for them to escape to Germany). Is this German fascism, or what? Poland and Hungary were very afraid that with the “fake passports” (usually no passports) refugees, a wave of terrorism would reach Europe, and Chancellor Merkel has admitted recently that it did. But it was Germany that blocked Visegrad Group’s proposal to increase funds to protect EU borders (prior to the crisis), it was Germany that wanted to punish Hungary for insisting on adhering to the EU law (Dublin regulation), it was Greece that threatened Europe (via their minister) to send terrorists into western Europe should Europe not give them money, and only V4 countries sent of couple of hundred of their policeman to Greece to help them to protect their borders (Greece’s attitude to their own borders was rather the opposite). In the past, the eastern border of Europe was a fortress in Kamieniec Podolski (now in Ukraine). At the time, England understood that it is vital to protect the Latin civilisation and was sending money to help maintaining the castle. Nowadays Europe – and Britain – has lost this survival instinct, blaming immigrants from Eastern Europe for everything, and turning a blind eye on real dangers.

I am interested in the remarkable focus put on Poland in this thread. It is surprising to me how little praise PiS gets on this blog - this party certainly claims to be transparent. It is socially conservative, (soft) euro-sceptic and patriotic, not nakedly capitalist, and distances government from the media. Until recently the worst one could say about the party (Beata Szydło is a commendable exception) was that it has an unfortunate tendency to engage in unseemly political quarrels with its many opponents. However, the proposal of some on the nationalist wing of the PiS to legislate to limit the discussion of Poland’s modern history was surely a mistake.

As far as I can see, Poland has shut the door on refugees even more firmly than Hungary.

"And her father has discussions holding forth about the Russians,Will the Red Chinese attack us ?Do we need the Yanks to back us? And life drifts slowly by in the provinces" lines from a 60s pop song from Al Stewarts Bed Sitter Images.

C. Morrison asked a very good question:
“If such a retreat and evacuation was "cowardly", then according to your argument any units of the Polish armed forces which ended up in the UK must have been "cowardly" as well.
What do you think they (both British and Polish soldiers) should have done?”

Well, to answer your question shortly, Polish soldiers put a heroic fight in September 39, and THEN some of them withdrew; England did not put ANY fight in 1939, and then – in 1940 – all withdrew.

And now in details:
1. Britain signed a military pact with Poland not in order to help Poland, but on the contrary – to buy time. During Anglo-Polish General Staff talks held in Warsaw at the end of May, the British assured that the Royal Air Force would attack industrial, civilian, and military targets (Prazmowska, “Britain, Poland and the Eastern Front”, pp. 94-95). General Sir Edmund Ironside then repeated this promise during an official visit to Warsaw in July: “The Poles could be confident that Britain would carry out bombing raids in Germany once hostilities began.” Watt, “Bitter Glory”, p. 408.
2. Hitler had concentrated almost all German military forces in the east, and France had one of the strongest armies in the world.
3. Britain’s 1939 “heroism” amounted to:
3.1 Ten RAF Whitley bombers dropping leaflets.
3.2 Bombing raid on German warships on September 4, resulting in Luftwaffe’s first victory against the RAF.
3.3 Removing 2 German engineers from the “Don Isidro” under the American flag (stocks reacted by surging almost 10%).
3.4 One British pilot shot in England by mistake.
3.5 British aircraft carrier “HMS Ark Royal” being attacked and British destroyers hunting down U-39.

So much for Peter’s fantasy world in which heroic Britain fulfils its obligation

What British soldiers should have done? As General Ironside commented in 1945: "Militarily we should have gone all out against the German the minute he invaded Poland ... We did not ... And so we missed the strategic advantage of the Germans being engaged in the East. We thought completely defensively and of ourselves." (Cienciala, “Poland and the Western Powers”, p. 249)

One has to realise that Poland has a choice – it didn’t have to ally with Britain: Hitler desperately – until early 1939 - wanted Poland to be part of the Axis, but Poland refused.

Poland’s contribution to British victory (among others):
- Battle for Britain
- Had Poland not shared her Enigma-decryption results, Britain would have been unable to read Enigma ciphers
- The Polish forces were the 4th largest Allied army in Europe
- Polish intelligence destroyed the German V-2 rocket facility and delivered to the UK key V2 parts
- British planed the amphibious November 1942 “Operation Torch” landings in North Africa based on information from Polish intelligence

"If Russia *is* such a major military threat to the peace and security of Europe and NATO such a 'must have' organisation in defence of that peace and security, why does Angela Merkel prioritise various so-called soft power alternatives rather than coughing up Germany's full whack to the NATO coffers, not to mention her apparent desire to see Europe finance its own hard power EU barmy army? That just doesn't make sense to me."

The answer is very simple - because until President Trump came to power, Germany has been getting away with not paying for their army (bear in mind, Germany has also got away with not paying war reparations to the likes of Poland or Czech Republic). For the last 70 year, the US was providing the hard power, so Germany could focus on soft power, bribing politicians in Europe via their foundations.

German aircraft, helicopters and other vehicles were being grounded due to lack of spare parts, bringing German army's readiness rates below 50%, because they knew that when push comes to shove, the US will cough up.

In spite of the myth of German engineering, when the Bundeswehr replaced the Heckler and Koch G3 battle rifle with the G36 assault rifle, it was discovered in Afghanistan that the G36 was losing accuracy in combat after sustained firing - a defect that should have been noticed sooner. When in February 2015 Panzergrenadier Battalion 371, based in Marienburg, was participating in a NATO exercise in Norway, broomsticks were painted black and pressed into service to simulate MG3 machine guns. This was not because Germany considered spreading killing weapons bad: when Yiannis Panagopoulos, who heads the Greek trade union confederation (GSEE), found himself sitting opposite Angela Merkel at a private meeting the German chancellor had called of European trade unionists in Berlin, and he asked Ms Merkel: "After running through all the reasons why austerity wasn't working in my country I brought up the issue of defence expenditure. Was it right, I asked, that our government makes so many weapons purchases from Germany when it obviously couldn't afford such deals and was slashing wages and pensions?", she her answer was to reiterate the issue of outstanding payments on submarines she said Germany had been owed for over a decade.

But when Mr Trump came to power and warned that the likes of Germany have to emulate the likes of the UK and Poland in terms of what they contribute to NATO, Germany announced a long term 150bn army spending program.

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